Changes in Meeting Physical Activity Guidelines After Discharge from the Military

Journal of Physical Activity Health

2015 May;12(5):666-674

Littman AJ, Jacobson IG, Boyko EJ, Smith TC

Using data from Millennium Cohort Study participants, we investigated changes in meeting federal Physical Activity Guidelines for moderate-to-vigorous activity (MVPA) following military discharge. MVPA declined more in those who were discharged than those who were not (-17.8 percentage points vs. -2.7 percentage points), with greater declines in former active-duty personnel, those who had deployed with combat exposures, had 14-25 years of service, and had been discharged more recently (<1 year prior). Reductions in MVPA were substantial and unexpected. Increased understanding of transitional periods that may benefit from interventions to mitigate declines in physical activity will help prevent excess weight gain and physical inactivity-associated health consequences.

Nearly half of the population studied reported use of energy, body building, or weight loss supplements, with energy supplements being the most highly endorsed (38%) supplement type. Deployment experience, physical activity, problem drinking, and suboptimal sleep emerged as important characteristics associated with supplement use, which may be of importance to medical planners and military policy makers in targeting adverse event monitoring and for future research determining how supplements affect performance and health over time.

This prospective study investigated the associations of recent divorce with health outcomes among US Service members. Findings indicate that recent divorce is associated with adverse mental health outcomes, including new-onset PTSD and depression, and risky behaviors, such as smoking initiation and new-onset alcohol-related problems, after adjusting for relevant demographics and covariates. Given these findings, it is important to make sure resources are available to support recently divorced Service members, since divorce may not only affect personal quality of life, but also military force readiness.

In this study population, nonresponse to the follow-up questionnaire did not result in appreciable bias as reflected by comparing measures of association for selected outcomes using complete case and inverse probability weighted methods.

Using latent semantic analysis to analyze the final open-ended text field on the Millennium Cohort questionnaire helped identify important topic areas for future survey questions and also revealed the most common areas of concern for participants were illness and injuries, exposures, and exercise. Subjects with worse self-reported general health were more likely to provide a response in the open-ended text field than subjects with better general health.

The largest ever evaluation of this topic revealed strong validity of self-reported vaccination, as well as unique health features of the small subset who may misreport vaccination. This work won awards at two research conferences in 2006.

Findings suggest that Reserve and National Guard personnel and younger service members who deploy with reported combat exposures are at increased risk of new-onset heavy weekly drinking, binge drinking, and other alcohol-related problems.

Newly reported lupus was not associated with military deployment in support of the current operations in Iraq and Afghanistan when compared with nondeployers. Our study did note a significantly decreased risk of newly reported rheumatoid arthritis among deployers with and without combat exposures when compared with nondeployers; the reason for this finding is unknown, but may be due to a selection effect for deployment.

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The Millennium Cohort Study is an authorized Department of Defense project at the Deployment Health Research Department, located at the Naval Health Research Center, in San Diego, California. OMB Control #: 0703-0064/RCS: DD-NAVY(AR)2678, and Primary Institutional Review Board Protocol # Naval Health Research Center.2000.0007.